“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

JANE’S NOTES

(Late yesterday afternoon [Monday], we were visited by Larry Dowler of the Yale Archives. He told us many things and answered—and asked—many questions. Seth came through briefly several times, and very humorously, to handle certain questions himself. Among other things, he said that “there is no place for the Seth material to be kept,” that “you have to make a place for it, for it is unique.” The interludes weren’t recorded, to my regret. Seth did express his own willingness to have the material available to the public, but Jane and I are much less sure of that.

(We liked L. Dowler, and will see what develops. This morning I made an appointment with Bill Danaher for tomorrow about a will. This morning Jane received Tam Mossman’s agreement to act as literary executor.

(Tam has rejected Stefan Schindler’s book on Seth – he did so last week—so this morning Jane called Eleanor Friede to see if she wanted to examine the work. Again, no. Then Jane called S. Schindler with that news; he in turn has “a list” of West Coast publishers he wants to try, evidently thinking the university press route won’t work.

(In the last three days I’ve learned a number of interesting things about my continuing physical upsets—and will list some of my pendulum material should any portion of this session refer to them. The deleted session for April 18 has helped a great deal. My own insights through the pendulum tell me, for example, why Seth in that last private session said I have a “nervous stomach,” but nothing about the other hassles like, say, the side or groin. [It all seems to stem from the initial stomach difficulty.] I need to study more. I still don’t want to burden Jane with a series of sessions on my own problems. I know I can—and am—working them out. Each bit of information is bound to help.

(Jane was quite upset because of all the time she spent on the calls this morning, plus the visits this noon by F. Longwell and H. Wheeler. Nor did I accomplish much. I mowed some grass, worked with the pendulum, helped Jane walk—she’s still taking steps—and wrote these notes. The pendulum insights may be most valuable, however.

(Not long after finishing Monday’s notes, then, we sat for the session. I didn’t feel too well. Within a few minutes, however, I noticed that I was becoming quite relaxed. I sat with this notebook on my lap but didn’t exert myself to open it. My arms and legs, and head and neck, began to feel looser and looser. “It looks like I picked up a suggestion about relaxation,” I told Jane. “But I’ll be okay. I want to have the session,” I said in answer to her questions. She sat opposite me, smoking, waiting to go into trance. My head flopped back against the couch. “Wow....”

(Soon I didn’t care, though. My condition became so totally relaxed that any conscious and deliberate movement was forgotten unless I made a strong effort to exert myself—to pick up a piece of paper, to lay this notebook on the coffee table, say. Fortunately I’d put the cats in the cellar before the session so I wouldn’t have to do it later. Jane was obviously concerned. “Are you all right?” she kept asking, and I hardly replied. This was easily the most complete experience of its kind I’d ever known, and it was deepening.

(As soon as she saw that I couldn’t take notes. Jane began describing to me what she’d started to pick up from Seth about my condition. I was both very interested and so far out in my own world of sensation that I could hardly comment. I was taking a “body vacation,” she told me. She said much more, which she wrote about briefly Tuesday afternoon at my request. Her notes are inserted at the end of my notes. Seth, Jane said, would explain the whole thing in the next session, whenever that would be held.

(Jane sat on the couch in her usual place to my left. By now I was far out of it: I doubt if I could have moved except in the direst emergency. As Jane talked I fell asleep a number of times. She said I snored so loudly that she had to turn the TV volume up in order to hear the programs. During half-waking periods I was conscious of my lower jaw continually dropping, so that I sat with my mouth gaping open in a most uncharacteristic manner. I slept through deep, immensely enjoyable and totally saturating periods of relaxation. After a while my arms began to twitch and jump spasmodically without my conscious volition. These reflexive reactions continued for some time, even later in the evening when I began to come out of the heavy sleep periods. But while they were happening I cared not at all.

(Jane, hungry, ate cookies and drank a glass of milk I’d set out for myself before the session. Lately during sessions she’s been sipping red wine. When I could speak coherently, I offered her the piece of cornbread I’d set out with the milk, but she refused it. By now, I was conscious enough to sit with her through the balance of a dated mystery movie starring Rock Hudson. [He was caught as the murderer, finally.]

(When I finally tried to get on my feet to get Jane more milk, however, I realized that my situation was far from over. I staggered around in the kitchen, taking six-inch steps with more than a little effort and caution. My knees felt loose as could be, but the muscles in the legs were heavy and stolid. I poured more milk for both of us, and ate the cornbread, half asleep as I did these things. When we decided to retire I shuffled about the house, cleaning up and locking doors and windows as Jane made ready for bed. I could have cheerfully collapsed at any time. I bumped into walls and door-jambs, or leaned on tables for support for minutes at a time. I yawned deeply and wished only for bed, over and over again.

(When finally I stared at myself in the bathroom mirror, I was more than a little disoriented—for a face confronted me that I hardly recognized. It was almost that of a stranger. I finally figured out why that mirror image confronted me with such an unreal quality: All the muscles and planes of my face were super-relaxed and smoothed out, so that the face at once looked both younger and older than its real age. My jaw hung. In the bedroom, I muttered to Jane that I hadn’t recognized myself.

(My state persisted—so much so that I felt like a long-distance runner nearing the finish line. I was engaged in a contest to see if I could help Jane get ready for bed, set the alarm and the electric blanket, turn out the bedroom lights and open the curtains and a window—all before I gave out in a heap on the bed. Indeed, I lost my balance twice while helping Jane undress, and each time collapsed on the bed beside her, to her evident concern. Nor were those episodes painless, for in one of them I put an unnatural strain on the deltoid muscle in my right shoulder. [I’d injured the shoulder last summer while pulling on the starting cord for the lawn mower; it’s bothered me ever since, although not steadily.] The pain was intense, although not as bad when I’d first hurt the muscle. I struggled to rouse myself enough so I could take pressure off the arm; I was afraid I’d re-injured it. So even in that state of deep relaxation, in which I could move only with effort and concentration, I learned something that I fully realized at the time: Even though I was far out on a “trip” of some sort, I could still feel pain. My muscles weren’t magically healing themselves, nor was I undergoing any kind of overall healing that might confound my own beliefs, or those of medical science. Not that I’d thought I was....

(But nevertheless, I knew I was having a most beneficial experience, and one that might very well head off other, deeper troubles. This I understood quite clearly. I believed Jane-Seth’s material about my being on a “body vacation.” It was impossible for me not to believe it, considering that I’d felt so poorly since early in the month, and that I was so much better right now. I just hoped more beneficial results would flow from the experience, and I was appalled that I’d been that badly off, that “tight,” so that my body greatly needed such a drastic kind of relief.

(I slept at once. although Jane lay awake until about 2 AM. I felt many reminders and remnants of the experience throughout the next day—Tuesday—especially in the arms and legs: They were often loose and floppy, with a peculiar lightness and ease of motion in the joints particularly. At my request Jane wrote her account of the non-session events of last night, and it’s attached. I noticed more signs of the same sort of relaxation before tonight’s session was due, and wondered if I could focus upon Seth clearly enough, or write fast enough. After a number of hesitations, which only confused Jane as to what I really wanted to do, I sat for the session.

(10:09 PM. “Before the session.” Jane said, “I told Seth I wanted whatever was necessary to help you. I didn’t care what it was. I’d stay out of the way as much as possible. If you were sick of me, or wanted out—anything—I just wanted to know so you’d get better. I know you love me, but maybe you get sick of my running your life or something like that....”

(Jane said more. She was so emphatic and serious that I had to laugh, though in a subdued way, for I still felt lingering effects from my deep relaxation of last night. I was, for instance, a bit slow writing these notes—yet, oddly, I’d been able to keep up with Seth all right during the session itself.

(I want to note that Jane continues her steady, if slow, improvement physically. I told her that her knees especially now show a noticeable increase in flexibility. She does her exercises faithfully twice a day.)